Goodbye Bella Italia, Bonjour France

Day 18 - August 16

I recall I woke up only around 8, and from the roof of the hotel with partial sea-view, I had a very good breakfast, with an omelette, prosciutto, fruits, jams - it was definitely worth the extra Eur 5 - I think I consumed about three times as much...

In the room, I had to ascertain that the odor of my garments (plus of the beach towel) was somewhat substandard, so after checking out at 10 am (rather late, eh?!), I found a laundry in town and a bit after noon, was ready, freshened up. While my stuff was in the machine, I put on my rain coat (looked rather weird in it) and did a small tour of this charming little town. The people were very friendly, at the market, I got special service, they cut a melon in slices for me.

It did not take long for me to fall in love with this part of the coast, I really enjoyed the colors of the houses, it was unmistakably Mediterranean.

I was riding through towns with the names of Chiavari, Zoagli and Rapallo. At the last one, there was a 9-km detour to Portofino - and it turned out to be one of the nicest roads that I had covered on this trip.

The town of Portofino itself was pretty, but very touristy - the Gucci shop did not fit well with the otherwise wonderful scenery, but I guess they have to cater for the passengers of the superyachts arriving there. There was one of these multimillion dollar yachts arriving there, I really do not understand why a huge crowd of people would just stand there to watch this thing dock. The yachts already docked had a sign "Private yacht - no entry to the public". This is what the town looks like with a couple of ships docked in its port.

There was only one road leading to Portofino, meaning now I had to head back on the same one, and I went in for a really pleasant swim - my stuff being watched by some friendly tourists from Albania.

Now I was about 35 kilometers away from the city of Genoa - and it was a wonderful ride. Let me share some of the impressions.

As I said, this was an unplanned voyage. I had a faint idea of riding to the Côte d'Azure in France and then pushing north towards Lyon or going to Marseille. About 30 kilometers away from the Genoa, at around 5:30 pm, I had this sudden thought of sailing somewhere and I knew there were ferries out of Genoa to Corsica (and other places). I googled the ferry timetable and saw that, yes, there was a departure at 9 pm, for about Eur 50, including my bike. Promptly, I made the decision "Corsica is a go!". I had 3 hours to get to the port, have something for dinner, do groceries and arrive in time for the ship - maybe even do some sightseeing of Genoa.

(This sudden change in direction was a déjà vu, when biking in Andalusia in 2017, I saw a ferry sailing to Morocco and jumped on it...)

Getting closer to the city, the nice, single-lane coast road with light traffic gave way to a 3-lane major road with lots of cars and my first impression of Genoa was that it was an awful city. Luckily, I was able to leave the ugly road going through the indistinct suburbs and roll down to the coastal road, much more pleasant and scenic, called Corso Italia.

I stopped at a local grocery store and made sure I had enough stuff for the 10-hour crossing. Then I stopped a pizzeria on the beach, I asked a family if they thought the pizza was good there - they did not know, but directed me to a different restaurant. WOW, that was an amazing choice. It was about 7:30 pm, my phone said I was only 5 kilometers away and asked if they could make a pizza quickly. The guy smiled at me and the pizza was there before I could settle in. Later I saw signs that the baking time is just 45 seconds for the thin, but very very delicious dough. It was called Pizzeria Moromare, it was one of the best pizzas I had eaten in a long time.

At 8:15, I left, thinking the ride to the ferry terminal would be just a few minutes - uh-oh, the road turned into a motorway, where no bikes were allowed. I was made to make a huge detour around town, with the benefit of actually seeing some of this city, which turned out to be a pretty one.

With about 20 minutes to spare, I found the ferry terminal (had to ride around it to get in), rode to the ship and to the constant nagging of a loading dock worker, dismantled by bike, taking half of my belongings with me to the deck. I also met Julian, a young biker from Innsbruck, it was nice chatting in "Austrian".

The ferry left pretty much on time and a few minutes after 9 pm, I watched Genoa and the beautiful Italian coast fade into the darkness.

The ship itself was quite large, about 8 decks, 3 of these for cars and the remaining floors for passengers, with full-service restaurant, self-service one, shops, a large playroom for kids and many many cabins.

I found out they had cabins available, however, the cheapest one would have cost Eur 130 - but remember, I had my tent with me. I had pitched tents earlier on decks, en route to Alaska from Seattle or from Odessa to Batumi in Georgia - and asked if this was possible. "Of course!" was the answer, "just don't get blown away by the wind". Luckily, the winds were not that strong, so at around 11 pm, by which time most people had left the uppermost deck, I found a nice spot to sleep.

Here is the map for the day - it was about 65 kilometers (spent the first half of the day having breakfast and washing my stuff) and about 500 meters of altitude change.